Ükäntel
Ükäntel is a head-final nom-acc agglutinative language with front-back vowel harmony. Phonology Consonants */t l/ are truly dental l̪ but usually transcribed without the distinguishing bar *Affricates are usually transcribed without a tie bar Allophony */h/ appears as x following a back vowel, ç after a front vowel (and likewise /h:/ as x: or ç:) and only appears as h pre-vocalically. *If /h/ is preceded by a different fricative, /h/ will assimilate and lengthen the preceding fricative, i.e. /sh/ is realized as s:. This does not happen following an affricate. *Short /r/ is tapped while /r:/ is trilled. *Plain alveolar consonants will assimilate to their "palatal counterparts' regardless of sequence and result in a lengthened segment */nj t͡sj sj rj/ become t͡ʃ ʃ d͡ʒ. /j/ is elided after existing /ɲ t͡ʃ ʃ d͡ʒ/. */ʃd͡ʒ d͡ʒʃ/ are realized as d͡ʒ: respectively. Vowels Allophony */i y u/ are realized as ʏ ʊ before sonorant consonants and before /j w/. *Long vowels and diphthongs can appear across syllable boundaries. Phonotactics Ükäntel syllables minimally consist of only a vowel and maximally are CVC. The syllable can thus be transcribed as ©V©. Any consonant can appear as the onset or coda, and any single vowel can act as a syllable nucleus. /ø o/ do not appear word-finally, having become /e ɤ/ in that environment, and suffixes containing the archiphoneme /O/ and no coda consonant thus may possibly have four variants due to a historical sound change. Stress Stress is non-phonemic and falls on the first syllable of a word. Stressed vowels are pronounced significantly longer than unstressed vowels. Vowels are not reduced when unstressed. Orthography Ükäntel orthography is largely phonemic and even represents certain allophonic processes in the written language. The sounds are written as in IPA unless listed in the table below. *<ńć ńŕ ńś gk> are spelled , that is, orthographic <ń g> will become if followed by those specific consonants *When /h/ assimilates to a fricative preceding it, the allophony is indicated in the orthography, i.e. will be written as depending on the fricative it follows. */j w/ are written as at the beginning of a word and between two vowels and as after a vowel or in between a consonant and vowel. *Geminate /j w/ are spelled . Clusters /jw wj/ are spelled respectively. *Alveolar-palatal assimilation is indicated orthographically. The sequences become <ń ś ć ŕ>. (phonetic /j/ and not /i/) are omitted following <ń ć ś ŕ>. However, <śŕ ŕś> remain unchanged. Morphophonology Morphophonological processes are rampant in Ükäntel, including the characteristic vowel harmony, as well as partial vowel reduplication and epenthesis. Vowel Harmony Vowels in Ükäntel pattern in front-back pairs with /i/ patterning neutrally. /y e ø æ/ alternate with /u ɤ o ɑ/ respectively, with archiphonemes being transcribed as /U E O A/. Vowels do not harmonize according to roundedness and thus all grammatical suffixes have two variants, unless the sole vowel is /i/ where one variant exists, or unless the suffix is an open syllable and contains the archiphoneme /O/ where four variants exist as per /ø o/ having become /e ɤ/ word-finally. Reduplication Many grammatical suffixes in Ükäntel use a reduplicated vowel from the preceding syllable as its own syllable nucleus. This is transcribed in grammars using a capital V in place of the vowel. A few verbal suffixes, personal suffixes on verbs, posessive suffixes on nouns, a few case suffixes, the comparative and superlative morphemes on adjectives, as well as various derivational morphemes all utilize this process. /ø o/ do become /e ɤ/ word-finally in this instance. Vowel Epenthesis Vowel epenthesis is necessary with certain grammatical suffixes as the stringing together of certain morphemes would violate the Ükäntel syllable structure. In many instances, the reduplicated vowel detailed in the above section is only present if syllabically necessary, and this is often considered an example of epenthesis, but is in fact separate due to various suffixes where the reduplicated vowel is always present. Some Ükäntel suffixes contain two consonants in what would seem to be a syllable onset, or some suffixes consist of a single consonant. If these suffixes follow a morpheme ending in a vowel, vowel epenthesis is not necessary. When following a morpheme that ends in a consonant (in both cases) or if sandwiched in between two consonants (in the latter case only), an epenthetic vowel is inserted before the suffix in question, which is ''-E'' in all cases. Morphology Ükäntel is an exclusively suffixing agglutinative language. Ignoring morphophonological processes, morphology is highly regular outside of a few defective roots. Throughout this section, archiphonemes are used. Annotations will not made where vowel epenthsis would possibly occur but will be where reduplication only occurs if syllabically necessary, denoted by an asterisk following the suffix. Nouns Posession Posession is indicated by a suffix in Ükäntel, which precedes the number and case suffixes. Case Ükäntel has 16 case suffixes, 8 singular and 8 plural; the nominative singular is unmarked. The nominative case is used to mark the subject of a sentence, more specifically, the agent of a transitive verb and the patient (also called the experiencer) of an intransitive verb. The accusative case is used to mark the patient (also called the object) of a transitive verb. The dative case is used to mark the recipient or geographical destination of an object, the object of verbs implying transfer or perception, the purpose or beneficiary of an action, as well as posession when coupled with the copula. '' '' The genitive case is used to mark the posessor of another noun, a noun which modifies another noun, description, geographic origin, and composition. The genitive noun always precedes its head and any modifiers thereof. The instrumental case is used to mark the means by which an action is done, whether physical or abstract. The comitative '''case is used to mark with whose company an action is done. The '''temporal case is used to mark when an action is done and can be applied to numbers to mean at ___ o'clock, or to noun phrases to mean on _____. The durative case is used to specify the length of an action or during what the action took place, meaning effectively for x ____ ''(where x is a numeral) or ''during _____ ''or ''throughout ______. Category:Languages